This gives such a great voice to feelings so many of us have, the term "convenience contradiction" sums up the trade-off we are passively accepting everyday in practically every aspect of our lives. I am old enough to notice the difference, but I really worry my kids aren't.
Love your words, this essay is the straw that broke the ‘joining substack’ camels back for me, excited to keep reading and choosing the path more frictioned
It's so un-motivating to come on here with every intention to write only to see that, once again, a better delivery and execution of the type of thing I want to say has already been said.
Then I realize I get to write about something else as this now exists and is mostly what I wanted to talk about.
Thanks for giving my time back and keeping my ego in check.
Enjoyed this very much. If we can summarise The Screwtape Letters as being about how the devil gets us by removing difficulty, it is an amusing irony that in the 1940s, Macmillan NY turned down a chance to take on the work because it thought it was too difficult for American readers. (NB I know this from archival research)
Kyla Scanlon: You stand as a good example that you don't have to go to Stanford or an Ivy League university to build a brilliant career. There are lots of great lecturers at great universities, colleges, junior colleges, community colleges and trade schools all over the USA. The trick -- admittedly easier said than done -- is finding the right fit, which might take some trial-and-error. Young Americans: don't let rejection keep you down at any age.
I am a recovering elitist and can't help noting that Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman commented in one of his substack posts that "there are a lot of good, interesting people in U.S. education, and not just in the high-prestige schools".
Great article! It captures the zeitgeist of the current moment. However, I also think people should be a little more realistic about what life is like, and I want to add my own mix of gloom and optimism to the discussion.
From my perspective, we are coming out of a literal golden age in terms of unipolar, rules-based moment when defense spending could fall and we could simultaneously borrow, cut taxes, and increase benefits (even if only temporarily). Things will probably worsen in the next 30 years (barring a massive technological explosion such as AI working out, a biotech revolution, etc.). There are plausible arguments for things getting better (I won't ruin the flavor of this discussion by doing it now, however).
So, granting that things do not appear great, I would point out that they could be a lot worse. Imagine being born in the late 1890s. You could have had the wonderful experience of fighting in WWI, enduring the Spanish Flu, living through the Great Depression, sending your kids to WWII, and or Korea, and your grandkids to Vietnam. There is a very high probability that you lost a child at a young age due to infant mortality, now curable disease, war or suicide/murder/vehicular death (suicides peaked in 1931 and twice what they are now, homicides and vehicular deaths were much higher in the 1970s and are now similar to the 1960s).
You would have been in your 70s during a massive economic malaise of the early 1970s and had to deal with enormous inflation (likely severely damaging your retirement funds at a time when going back to work was difficult). You would also have seen several virulent flu pandemics and worried about nuclear annihilation. Maybe you die in 1980 or so before things get back to a more stable equilibrium and are still concerned with your grandkids and great grandkids (spoiler, they've lived through the 1990s and a pretty good couple of decades).
This was roughly my grandparents' life (they were born in the early 1900s, so they did not actually fight in WWI). I'm kind of glad I live now, but they seemed happy enough, and it was not all bad. Honestly, even as bad as it was, they had things pretty good compared to their grandparents.
Despite all this disruption, war, disease, and economic dislocation, they would also have seen the creation of penicillin, vaccines that defeated horrific diseases like polio, a move from agricultural economies to industrialized ones, and then a nascent information technology that would lead to some pretty nice jobs relative to farming or assembly line work.
I have no idea how our current shift will work out, but failing to adapt will not make it better. I'm old but have just started using AI for work and fun in the last year. It seems pretty transformative, especially on the creative front.
I hope people do not take a fatalistic view of our current problems and instead realize that what we are experiencing now, while novel to us, is likely more the norm of the human condition, at least since the advent of the industrial revolution, and not the exception. This is why the Screwtape Letters (written in the early 1940s) resonate. If you want to feel good, compare our current times with those Lewis lived through.
First, thank you for spot on cultural commentary. So helpful. And if you’re not already familiar with these authors, I’d like to call to your attention Jacques Ellul (The Technological Society and much more), and Peter Turchin and cliodynamics. I look forward to more from you.
The article is somewhat incoherent: how can you say life is frictionless directly after saying "Gen Z is the most rejected generation in history". Seems to me that that would be a lot of friction! The statement you can actually make is more like: "life has never been more full of friction, except for buying things"
Your comparison of the Screwtape letters with our current socioeconomic situation is absolutely brilliant Kyla. You have very keen insight. I enjoy reading your newsletter.
Kyla, what a wonderful articulation of so many of the things that I've noticed and felt but not found the vocabularly to express.
Thank you!!
This gives such a great voice to feelings so many of us have, the term "convenience contradiction" sums up the trade-off we are passively accepting everyday in practically every aspect of our lives. I am old enough to notice the difference, but I really worry my kids aren't.
100% for kids, its a muscle
So much insight in one piece. Really great stuff.
Really well done. Thank you!
Love your words, this essay is the straw that broke the ‘joining substack’ camels back for me, excited to keep reading and choosing the path more frictioned
yes!! thank you!
This is the best essay you've written in a while
Thank you!
It's so un-motivating to come on here with every intention to write only to see that, once again, a better delivery and execution of the type of thing I want to say has already been said.
Then I realize I get to write about something else as this now exists and is mostly what I wanted to talk about.
Thanks for giving my time back and keeping my ego in check.
Write! Let it pour from you!
Enjoyed this very much. If we can summarise The Screwtape Letters as being about how the devil gets us by removing difficulty, it is an amusing irony that in the 1940s, Macmillan NY turned down a chance to take on the work because it thought it was too difficult for American readers. (NB I know this from archival research)
Wonderful piece and I thoroughly enjoy your writing.
This is really lovely, and sobering!
If you’re not already familiar with it, you might enjoy Jim Forest’s “The Wormwood File.”
not familiar, thanks for sharing!
Kyla Scanlon: You stand as a good example that you don't have to go to Stanford or an Ivy League university to build a brilliant career. There are lots of great lecturers at great universities, colleges, junior colleges, community colleges and trade schools all over the USA. The trick -- admittedly easier said than done -- is finding the right fit, which might take some trial-and-error. Young Americans: don't let rejection keep you down at any age.
yes - Western Kentucky University made me who I am today!
I am a recovering elitist and can't help noting that Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman commented in one of his substack posts that "there are a lot of good, interesting people in U.S. education, and not just in the high-prestige schools".
Great article! It captures the zeitgeist of the current moment. However, I also think people should be a little more realistic about what life is like, and I want to add my own mix of gloom and optimism to the discussion.
From my perspective, we are coming out of a literal golden age in terms of unipolar, rules-based moment when defense spending could fall and we could simultaneously borrow, cut taxes, and increase benefits (even if only temporarily). Things will probably worsen in the next 30 years (barring a massive technological explosion such as AI working out, a biotech revolution, etc.). There are plausible arguments for things getting better (I won't ruin the flavor of this discussion by doing it now, however).
So, granting that things do not appear great, I would point out that they could be a lot worse. Imagine being born in the late 1890s. You could have had the wonderful experience of fighting in WWI, enduring the Spanish Flu, living through the Great Depression, sending your kids to WWII, and or Korea, and your grandkids to Vietnam. There is a very high probability that you lost a child at a young age due to infant mortality, now curable disease, war or suicide/murder/vehicular death (suicides peaked in 1931 and twice what they are now, homicides and vehicular deaths were much higher in the 1970s and are now similar to the 1960s).
You would have been in your 70s during a massive economic malaise of the early 1970s and had to deal with enormous inflation (likely severely damaging your retirement funds at a time when going back to work was difficult). You would also have seen several virulent flu pandemics and worried about nuclear annihilation. Maybe you die in 1980 or so before things get back to a more stable equilibrium and are still concerned with your grandkids and great grandkids (spoiler, they've lived through the 1990s and a pretty good couple of decades).
This was roughly my grandparents' life (they were born in the early 1900s, so they did not actually fight in WWI). I'm kind of glad I live now, but they seemed happy enough, and it was not all bad. Honestly, even as bad as it was, they had things pretty good compared to their grandparents.
Despite all this disruption, war, disease, and economic dislocation, they would also have seen the creation of penicillin, vaccines that defeated horrific diseases like polio, a move from agricultural economies to industrialized ones, and then a nascent information technology that would lead to some pretty nice jobs relative to farming or assembly line work.
I have no idea how our current shift will work out, but failing to adapt will not make it better. I'm old but have just started using AI for work and fun in the last year. It seems pretty transformative, especially on the creative front.
I hope people do not take a fatalistic view of our current problems and instead realize that what we are experiencing now, while novel to us, is likely more the norm of the human condition, at least since the advent of the industrial revolution, and not the exception. This is why the Screwtape Letters (written in the early 1940s) resonate. If you want to feel good, compare our current times with those Lewis lived through.
First, thank you for spot on cultural commentary. So helpful. And if you’re not already familiar with these authors, I’d like to call to your attention Jacques Ellul (The Technological Society and much more), and Peter Turchin and cliodynamics. I look forward to more from you.
Brilliant! Thank you Kyla. This paper should be published in all the social media’s accounts and studied in high schools🤩
The article is somewhat incoherent: how can you say life is frictionless directly after saying "Gen Z is the most rejected generation in history". Seems to me that that would be a lot of friction! The statement you can actually make is more like: "life has never been more full of friction, except for buying things"
Your comparison of the Screwtape letters with our current socioeconomic situation is absolutely brilliant Kyla. You have very keen insight. I enjoy reading your newsletter.